• Has A Las Vegas Casino Ever Been Robbed
• Has Anyone Ever Robbed A Vegas Casino

Today, we have a collection of some of the best casino heists of all time. These might not all be the “biggest heists ever,” but they are definitely the most interesting. Surprisingly, a few of these people managed to get away clean. As for everyone else… well, you’ll have to read on to see how they fared.

Bill’s Stardust Robbery In-House Job $500K. In 1992, William Brennan, a cashier who worked for. A suspect remained at large Wednesday after a robbery last week at a downtown Las Vegas casino sports book. The robbery was reported at 6:35 p.m. 13 at the Plaza, 1 S. Main St., according to. My uncle had someone come into his room at the Tropicana and lift his wallet while he was sleeping. This was in the mid-90's. Other than him, I don't know anyone personally that was robbed or had anything stolen from them in Vegas. Slotty Vegas reserves the right to suspend a cash-out request pending verification Has A Casino Ever Been Robbed of User’s identity, age and location of the bearer of the account. The subscriber implicitly gives his authorization to the processing of Has A Casino Ever Been Robbed.

Now, let’s see who got away, who got caught and who got killed in some of the most brazen (and ridiculous) casino heists of all time.

1. Bill Brennan – The One That Got Away

Bill Brennan was a cashier at the Stardust Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas in 1992 when he decided to pull off one of the greatest casino robberies of all time. He had been a long term employee of the casino for years, so nobody took notice when he simply walked out the front door one day with a duffel bag containing $500,000 worth of stolen cash and chips.

This might not be the biggest casino heist of all time, but it’s definitely one of the best. To this day, Bill Brennan has never been captured. He might be living it up on a beach in Mexico or he might be dead for all we know. One thing is certain though; he’s not sitting in a jail cell.

2. Not Quite Bonnie and Clyde

Heather Tallchief was an armored car driver making a stop at the Circus Circus casino in 1993 when she suddenly drove off with $2.5 million in cash. She managed to get away clean until turning herself in 12 years later. She was sentenced to only five years in prison for the crime.

Upon further questioning, Heather revealed that it was her boyfriend who had convinced her to pull off the robbery. The only problem is that her boyfriend took the money and disappeared after Heather had their baby. Roberto Solis, the alleged mastermind of this whole operation, has never been seen or heard from since.

So did this mystery boyfriend really take the money and run or does Heather Tallchief have a couple million dollars buried somewhere on the outside? That’s anybody’s guess, but what we do know is that the money hasn’t been turned in to authorities.

3. The Biker Bandit

In December of 2010, a man on a motorcycle parked his bike in the valet area, walked into the Bellagio wearing his helmet and used a gun to steal about $1.5 million worth of chips. He then made a clean getaway on his conveniently-placed motorcycle.

The only problem is that many of the chips that the biker bandit stole were high value chips, worth $25,000 apiece. The casino soon put out an alert to all cashiers (and spread the news to the entire gambling community) that high denomination chips were recently stolen. The Bellagio later issued a statement saying it would discontinue all $25,000 chips within the next couple of weeks.

This put the biker bandit under considerable pressure to get rid of his chips. So, he made an account at a popular online poker forum and joined a discussion about the robbery. Eventually, he met someone through the poker forums, sent pictures of the stolen chips and offered to sell the chips at a discount. The other person contacted the police and the biker bandit was quickly apprehended.

4. The Hopper Family Heists

Back in the early 90s, a family from Texas moved to Las Vegas for a fresh start. The head of the family, a man named Royal Mayne Hopper, got a job as a security guard at the Stardust Casino. He used his time there to learn the security procedures for the casino and then hatched a plan that would eventually net more than a million dollars.

For the first scheme, Royal enlisted his son to pull a fake stickup. While Royal and a coworker were escorting money through the casino, Royal’s son Bobby showed up with a mask and gun and demanded the guards to hand over the money. Royal reported the incident as if he had no idea who the robber was. This earned the Hoppers more than $150,000.

The second time around, Royal enlisted both of his sons, Bobby and Jeff, to rob an armored truck outside the Stardust. Jeff called in a false report of a fight at the pool. Royal, Bobby and a man named Wesley Carroll waited for the armored truck with wigs and fake beards.

When the truck driver showed up, the robbers deployed smoke bombs as a further diversion and rushed the armored truck driver. They took 2 bags containing more than a million dollars in currency and negotiable instruments.

Everyone eventually got caught and did time, but they got away with a lot of money for a while. Interestingly, I got in touch with Jeff Hopper some time ago and we had a long interview. He has an awesome story to tell about his life in crime, sentence and turn to the good side of the law.

See the Jeff Hopper interview here.

5. The Soviet Commando from Cuba

Jose Vigoa grew up in Cuba but was sent to the Soviet Union to join the Spetsnaz special forces group. He later returned to Cuba and then moved to the United States during the Mariel boatlift of 1980. He eventually made his way to Las Vegas and tried to live the good life. Unfortunately, he found it difficult to make a living in Las Vegas. This is when he decided to put his special forces training to a new purpose…

Jose Vigoa joined the Las Vegas underworld, started dealing drugs and eventually did a little time in prison. When he was released, he once again had a hard time making a living. This time around, though, he decided to use his surveillance and weapons skills to rob armored trucks and five casinos. He got away with several million dollars during this time, but his last casino robbery was less than successful.

Wearing nothing more than a baseball cap and sunglasses, Jose Vigoa entered the Bellagio and staged yet another heist. This time, however, the casino managed to get detailed, close-up images of the weakly-disguised Vigoa. He was eventually located and, after a high speed chase with police, sentenced to 500 years in prison.

6. Lasers, Not Guns

For our last casino heist, we make the switch from brazen stickups to brainy schemes. In 2004, a group of three people armed with nothing more than lasers and a dream entered the Ritz Casino in London and made off with £1.2 million at the roulette table. The team somehow used the lasers to estimate the speed of the roulette wheel and then figure out the most likely numbers for the ball to land.

The most interesting part of all is that although the roulette scheme team was caught and arrested, a judge let them go scot-free. Somehow, the scheme slipped through a legal loophole and allowed the trio to walk out of prison, richer by £1.2 million. Not bad for a few days’ work I’d say.

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Bellagio Cash Cage Robbery (2000)

As the new millennium came around, the percentage of casino robberies increased to 10-20 more attempts made every year on both small- and large-scale establishments. However, the most prolific of these early 2000s attempts was the Bellagio Cash Cage robbery. Oscar Cisneros then 23 and Jose Manuel Vigoa then 40 entered the casino wearing Kevlar and extensive body armor. Both were carrying firearms and they proceeded to jump over the counter and rob the cashier area. They managed to steal around $160,000 from the counter in both cash and casino chips. As they fled the scene one of them fired a round at one of the security guards however no one was injured.

Multiple security issues were later found in the casino which included:

• Lack of CTTV which made it harder to convict the two perpetrators
• Lack of entrance security to prevent the two men from entering in the first place
• No emergency button behind the counter to instantly alert the authorities, this was done by an eyewitness in the casino hall.

Authorities soon caught up with the pair and arrested them almost half an hour after the initial incident had occurred. Both men were detained in Clark County Detention Center awaiting trial. However, Cisneros would commit suicide before his trial could take place by hanging himself in his cell. Vigoa was convicted alongside previous charges against him which included multiple casino robberies and the murders of two officers in Henderson. He pleaded guilty to all of these and was sentenced to 4 no-parole life sentences and an additional 306 to 760 years in prison. This robbery carried out in the heart of the American gambling industry would help encourage many casinos to install barred cashier areas to prevent this from happening so easily again.

Circus Circus Theft (1993)

The Circus Circus theft proves to be one of the most bizarre cases on our list. One of the alleged thieves would turn herself over to the authorities almost 12 years after she escaped with nearly $3 million in an armored truck. The perpetrator was a woman named Heather Tallchief who was a former Loomis Armor Inc driver. She confessed to her crimes stating that mounting guilt and constantly living on the run had made her weary. She also had a then 10-year-old son who she said she wanted to have a relatively normal life. Her then-boyfriend named Roberto Solis who was also a named suspect remains at large however with the two not seeing eye to eye on the situation.

Tallchief stated that she had fled to the Netherlands (where she met Solis) very soon after the heist had taken place. She also said that Solis still had all the money she had stolen. Still to this day neither he nor the money has been found by police of either nation. Tallchief would receive a five year and three-month sentence for her crimes and has since been released.

Bellagio ‘Biker Bandit’ Robbery (2010)

The second Bellagio robbery on our list, The Biker Bandit of 2010 went down in national history due to the nature of the heist. Anthony Carleo then 29 stole approximately $1.5 million worth of casino chips from Bellagio during a daring and fast-paced heist. He drove to the entrance on a motorbike (later revealed to be stolen) walked into the casino hall and started to demand chips from multiple tables at once threatening employees with a firearm. His initial heist was successful, and he managed to escape without being caught by police who arrived soon after he left.

Carleo would try and sell all the chips on an online poker website. He had multiple denominations including chips worth $25,000. He used the email cranberrykid25@yahoo.com in reference to the color of the chips he was trying to sell. He signed the emails with the phrase ‘biker bandit’. Almost seven weeks after the initial robbery had taken place, police managed to track him down. At this time, he was gambling with his ‘winnings’ and attempting to sell the chips online. Undercover officers managed to track him with his selling information. Carleo, the son of a former municipal court judge, confessed in front of a court and in August 2011 he was sentenced to 9 to 27 years in prison for the Bellagio incident and an earlier heist attempt at the Suncoast Casino 5 days before.

Stardust Casino theft (1992)

The Stardust Casino theft manages to be one of the most overlooked heists to take place in recent years perhaps due to the fact that the casino in question has now been demolished. William John Brennan a 34-year-old from Pennsylvania and an employee of Stardust Casino is suspected of stealing over $500,000 worth of cash and casino chips. He was never arrested for this and has not been since having vanished the scene and probably the country soon after.

When it took place back in 1992 it was considered a very prominent theft and received national and local news coverage. Police issued a warrant for his arrest, but they have been unsuccessful in arresting the man who still remains the main suspect to this day. Many of his fellow co-workers described him as ‘clean-cut’ and someone who kept to himself. Nothing is known of his current whereabouts or activities and he still remains wanted by police.

Treasure Island Robberies (2000)

The Treasure Island Robberies became infamous back in the 2000s due to a botched operation and multiple security guards being injured during the incident. Having had multiple attempts made on the casino in the same year security number would gradually increase over the course of the year. Reginald Johnson then 27 years old approached the entrance and fired a shot at one of the security guards while he walked towards the main cashier area. He left empty-handed however and was arrested a few hours later at the Luke Mead Boulevard, Johnson and his brother Donnell had previously been suspects in a July 2000 robbery at Treasure Island where they were also unsuccessful.

Has A Las Vegas Casino Ever Been Robbed

In October 2000 an unknown assailant also hit the casino firing two shots at casino security and getting away with $30,000 in cash.

Reginald Johnson was convicted in January 2001 after pleading guilty to all three Treasure Island robberies. He was sentenced to 130 years in prison during an eventful court session where Johnson had several tantrums during the hearing and even laughed while watching the CCTV footage of him shooting the security. The Treasure Island robberies to this day remain some of the most notorious incidents in all of American history.

Has Anyone Ever Robbed A Vegas Casino

There have been attempts to rob online casinos over the years. However, in general, these have proved to be unsuccessful. You can read about online casino safety on our homepage. We also have some advice on how to stay safe while playing online in our real money gambling guide.